Pairinsg: Stefan/Katherine, Stefan/Damon, Stefan/Rebekah, Stefan/Elena, Stefan/Klaus
Rating: Mature for brief mentions of rape, incest, and violence.
Disclaimer: I own nothing. For entertainment purposes only.
Summary: Six Stefan centric drabbles.
-x-
1864
Linen curtains shift and sway in the window against a warm summer breeze, as pale moonlight glows around the edges and casts shadows into the room.
Stefan lays sprawled across the bed, his eyes distractedly following the shadows while Katherine's lips and teeth travel down his chest, leaving a trail of bloody kisses.
It's happening again, Katherine's chosen his company for tonight. He lies still beneath her, a slave to her whims. Anything and everything she wants, his blood, his body, his blind devotion. His silenced protests are caught in his throat, his fears shifting to lust, his revulsion to affection. She twists his love with a lingering stare and a few choice words.
Her lips descend upon his again, wanton and possessive, with the faint metallic taste of blood that she shares with him. His cries are muffled moans stifled in his throat, as his traitorous arms reach out to draw her in.
It's happening again, and all his reasons for why not are lingering afterthoughts in his mind he can't make sense of anymore. All he knows is that Katherine is a monster, and now he belongs to her.
-x-
1912
He sees Damon for the first time in half a century. And his memories return to warm summer afternoons passing a ball back and forth in the fields, and swimming at the local creek. Nights spent held up in each other's rooms, candlelight fading in the background as they trade stories about the faraway places they'll visit, and the women they'll love one day.
Damon wears the same look of accusation he did the day they parted, and other memories return. Memories of the day Damon left him alone in an empty house filled with the bodies and ghosts of his victims. And it's with a bitter taste on his tongue he tells his brother he's not like that anymore.
They sit at the bar of a nearby tavern and pass a bottle of bourbon between them, and Stefan tells stories of how he's found a new way to live. He's no longer that monster that once left a trail of bodies in his wake, a slave to the blood.
Damon passes the bottle, nods along as he listens to Stefan's words. And he tells his own stories of how he's found a new way to live, savoring the blood of his victims, savoring life, thriving over surviving. And Stefan listens until the words start to echo in his ears.
Other memories return to the night Katherine appeared in his bedroom with Damon. She tells her own stories of how their future will be, the three of them wandering the earth, together forever. Placing a hand on each of their shoulders she offers them her encouragement, and he can still feel the give of ground beneath his feet when she finally brings them together, his sheltered world unraveling at the seams.
But he hasn't been that innocent boy in a very long time. And decades of resolve crumbles beneath his fingertips when Damon drags him out into the night with a young lady unfortunate enough to be there. This time Damon has the first bite before offering her to Stefan. And if he weren't so far gone, he could almost laugh (cry) at the irony.
Damon draws him in and crashes their lips together, rough and demanding as it always is, offering a mouth full of blood Stefan is too starving/desperate/aching to resist.
As he gives in he can still feel Katherine's hand on his shoulder, offering her encouragement.
-x-
1922
Sometimes Stefan likes to pretend, when Rebekah is in his arms swaying along to the bluesy rhythm of the band. He pretends she's just a girl and he's just a boy, and they're young and in love in a city bursting with bootleg champagne, jazz music, and speakeasy's.
Other times Stefan likes to remember who he is, underneath his tailored suits, styled hair, and boyish charm. Rebekah is there drinking from the neck of a young woman discretely positioned between them, and he can't decide which tastes better, the blood flowing from the woman's carotid, or the blood dripping red from the corner of Rebekah's mouth.
And there are times Stefan just wants to lose himself in her, in the early morning hours lying underneath white linen sheets, his rod iron bed creaking beneath them. Her lips brush against his in long, languishing kisses. And he starts to feel some trace of affection with her arms wrapped around him, some long lost emotion.
But it's there only skin deep, because it's been a decade since he's flipped the switch and felt anything. He can't (won't) let any of it in, the chaos of love and pain he's built walls against.
That and the pieces of his heart never did seem to fit back together, not after Katherine's treatment left them shattered.
-x-
2009
He saves a girl from a car crash, wearing the face of the woman who still haunts his dreams.
After he has to be sure. He watches the girl from a distance for days, and finds where there was once entitlement and manipulation; there is now warmth and compassion.
And it feels like a second chance, like everything he's ever wanted to want.
They meet, and this girl little by little accepts him into her life, at first as the boy who asks her out to parties, and cooks dinners for her in her home. Then as the vampire she discovers, and he's careful to share with her the parts he's spent decades cultivating (decades he's spent containing the monster there just beneath the surface).
Holding his face in her hands, she traces her fingertips over the darkened and swollen veins around his eyes, her own eyes reflecting the grief and loss they share. She asks him not to hide from her, and presses her lips to his in ardent, searing kisses.
And more than anything he wants to believe that this time it can be different. He can almost feel the broken shards of his heart again, after years of nothing.
Elena becomes his exception, she breaks through all of his defenses with ease, and he can't decide whether that's a good thing.
-x-
2010
He's off the rails again.
He trades his freedom in exchange for his brother's life, and follows Klaus from one highway to another, from one out of the way bar to another, from one run down motel room to another.
And tonight will end the way it always does, in tears and screams in the back room of a near empty bar, splattered in blood.
Klaus is the one to draw in their victims, all charm and disarming smiles until he has them where he wants them, nowhere to run. Like a spider at the center of a wide reaching web.
Stefan is the one that gives chase, lost in the thrill and adrenaline; his teeth scrape and draw blood from one torn neck, to another, to another. Putting on a show the way Klaus would have it. (He tells this himself this over and over.)
When it's over Klaus whispers into his ear, this is what you're made for, as Stefan tries to piece together his victims. He commits it all to memory, because any moment now he'll flip the switch, and the broken pieces of his conscience will finally shut down and offer a last refuse. But for now he forces himself to feel everything, because soon he'll feel nothing, and he'll relive it all for entirely different reasons.
Klaus leads him to a mirror behind the bar and stands him before it, running a finger along his blood soaked chin. Their eyes meet in the reflection, and he doesn't resist, never does when Klaus backs him into a corner and brings their mouths together to share the blood. Cruel and vicious, Klaus's fangs break through his bottom lip to savor the rich, cooper taste.
And it's all too familiar. Because this is who he is, the monster Katherine unleashed and he embraced, the monster he reverts to time and time again. It was only a matter of time before someone just as broken found him and reminded him, offering all the excuses he would ever need.
-x-
2011
Her still form lies before him on a gurney, small droplets collecting into puddles beneath her still damp clothes. Her skin is pale beneath the florescent lights, and his fingers itch to smooth over the stray strands of her dark hair from her forehead. But his arms remain frozen where they lay in his lap.
He'd gotten there in time to find Matt's truck submerged, and at her urging he saves her loved one first. Only he wasn't fast enough getting back, returning to find her lifeless body swaying with the current of the water. And when the compressions to her chest and the air he breathes into her lungs aren't enough to bring her back, the cry that threatens to rise from his chest feels enough to finally break him wide open.
At the morgue he sits beside her and waits, at a complete loss as to what comes next. And when Meredith finds him and tells him about the vampire blood; he clings to this second chance he'd stopped letting himself hope for the day he left with Klaus.
But wasn't it was always leading to this, being with her, sharing her life, kisses, and blood. With kisses and blood Katherine once bestowed upon him. How many times had it almost come to this. The night he'd lost him mind, fed her his blood and threatened to drive them over the edge of Wickery Bridge. The two nights Damon threated to turn her into their vampire girlfriend, the one out of retribution, the other out of desperation. And the words they shared the night Klaus came for her still rings in his ears.
If it were my choice, I'd want to be with you, forever.
I don't want to be a vampire Stefan; I never wanted to be one.
She'll be a Vampire, and she'll live out her worst nightmares (his darkest dreams.)
And he shouldn't want to want this, but a part of him simply does. So he allows himself one moment to give in, palms her face in his hands, and places a gentle kiss on her pale blue lips, sharing with her breath and life.
Soon she'll wake in transition, her body racked with hunger calling her to feed, the blood of a predator flowing through her. She'll share in the gift of his immortality, and the curse of his blood lust. And she'll survive, because that is what she does. She survives everything life hands to her.
And he'll share in her struggles and grief for her human life, taking them upon himself. He'll be her teacher, her partner, her scape goat, her accomplice. Whatever she needs him to be, because that is want he does.
It's an ending offering endless beginnings. And as much as he regrets, this is one thing he can't bring himself to. (Even if he'll never again give voice to these thoughts.)